Magistrate

ARTICLES ABOUT MAGISTRATE BY DATE - PAGE 4

President Clinton on Thursday nominated U.S. District Judge Ann Claire Williams to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit. The White House also nominated Ronald A. Guzman, U.S. magistrate judge for the Northern District of Illinois, to the U.S. District Court in Chicago. Both nominations were sent to the U.S. Senate for approval. Williams of Chicago has served in federal court here since 1985. Guzman of La Grange Park has been a magistrate since 1990.

Spain's request to have Gen. Augusto Pinochet extradited for human-rights abuses allegedly committed during his 17-year rule in Chile will be heard Sept. 27, a magistrate ruled Friday. In a blow to Spanish investigators, judge Graham Parkinson said the charges against the 83-year-old Pinochet must be finalized by Aug. 31, in the interests of fairness. Pinochet was arrested Oct. 16 in London at the request of Spanish magistrate Baltasar Garzon, who wants to try the former Chilean leader for human-rights abuses allegedly committed at the hands of his security forces during his 1973-90 regime.

A man accused in an arson fire in which his wife and young son almost died was ordered held without bond Thursday by a federal magistrate who called the defendant "about the meanest man I can think of." Saying that John T. Veysey III represented a "severe risk of danger" to society, U.S. Magistrate Judge Martin Ashman ordered that the Galena man remain in custody in the Metropolitan Correctional Center until trial. Veysey, 33, was charged last month in federal court in Chicago in connection with a 1998 house fire in suburban Cary in which his second wife and son, John IV, were injured and had to be rescued by firefighters.

A federal judge, overruling the decision of a magistrate, ordered a suspect in a physical assault on a government witness held Friday without bond pending trial. U.S. District Judge James Zagel, acting on an emergency motion brought by prosecutors, ruled the early-morning confrontation at the witness' home threatened the integrity of a continuing federal probe. A U.S. magistrate judge had agreed Thursday to release the suspect, Joseph Basinski of Las Vegas, on $100,000 bond and electronic monitoring, but prosecutors appealed the decision to Zagel.

A defiant Gen. Augusto Pinochet entered a London courtroom in a wheelchair on Friday and declared that he would not recognize the authority of any court except one in Chile to try him "against the lies of Spain." Magistrate Graham Parkinson ordered him to remain in Britain on bail and set Jan. 18 for his next hearing. At that time, full hearings will begin on a Spanish request that Pinochet be extradited to stand trial for crimes against humanity. Some legal experts predict the hearings could last two years.

An Indianapolis man accused of traveling to the Chicago area to have sex with a minor he met on the Internet can be released to his home on electronic monitors, a federal magistrate ruled Thursday. Robert M. Carpenter, 51, was arrested Monday at a park in East Hazel Crest, where he had gone to meet what he thought was a 12-year-old girl, authorities said. Carpenter was ensnared in an undercover operation in which police posed as the girl in a computer chat room. U.S. Magistrate Judge W. Thomas Rosemond Jr. agreed to let Carpenter be released from custody so he could continue to work.

The Mexico City judge who freed five suspects in the slaying of an American businessman further fanned the controversy Tuesday by suggesting that the killer was a member of the victim's New York-based company. Mexican authorities, meanwhile, reportedly were trying to re-arrest the suspects while they appeal the judge's ruling. During a news conference in her office, Judge Maria Claudia Campuzano defended her ruling, which has caused an international furor and prompted a formal U.S. protest.

An Italian magistrate recommended Monday that Prime Minister Romano Prodi be tried for alleged abuse of office and conflict of interest during his chairmanship of the giant state holding company IRI. Prodi, who has led a center-Left government since May, reacted by saying he has done no wrong and has full confidence in Italy's judicial system. The requested indictment relates to alleged irregularities in IRI's 1993 sale of the food firm Cirio to consortium Fis.Vi. News agencies said deputy public prosecutor Giuseppa Geremia's probe concluded that Fis.Vi had an "unjust advantage" in the deal due to favorable terms from IRI's board.

Former Olympic Games security guard Richard Jewell will be allowed to examine sealed FBI documents from search warrant affidavits that lay out the grounds for federal suspicion against him, a magistrate ruled Friday. According to a copy of the 11-page order obtained by Reuters news agency, federal officials have one week to provide Jewell and his lawyers with witness information that could shed light on what led FBI investigators to his door. Issued late Friday by U.S. Magistrate Gerrilyn Brill, the order raises the possibility that Jewell's lawyers could determine whether the federal government had probable cause to secure four search warrants against their client and to name him as a suspect.

Zimbabwe doctors and some magistrates joined thousands of civil servants Thursday in a strike that has crippled social services. The walkout entered a third day despite calls by union leaders for a return to work and pledges by the government to discuss salary demands. In this capital, about 5,000 workers milled in a central park, some denouncing the government of President Robert Mugabe. The workers have rejected wage increases of up to 8 percent as "an insult" and were incensed by rumors that Mugabe went on a honeymoon with his former secretary at the start of the strike.